


Hide and Seek

by TheRothwoman



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alcohol, Chocolate, Christmas, Christmas Fluff, Cooking, Domestic Avengers, Domestic Fluff, Drinking to Cope, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Food Kink, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Sexual Content, Kissing, M/M, Mistletoe, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Singing, Stucky Secret Santa 2016, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-27
Updated: 2016-12-27
Packaged: 2018-09-12 14:29:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9076606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheRothwoman/pseuds/TheRothwoman
Summary: A smattering of encounters re: Steve and Bucky and some mistletoe in their house.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [KittyAugust (KittyAug)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KittyAug/gifts).



> My Stucky Secret Santa fic for [KittyAugust](http://archiveofourown.org/users/KittyAug)! She gave me a list of possible prompts and one of them was "mistletoe," so I had this idea about a migrating sprig of mistletoe and some possible ways that Steve and Bucky might kiss with it (with a single detour into heavy angst, because when Christmas Month includes the anniversary of Winter Soldier's Great Double-Stark Murderization it's a little hard to ignore that). Hope she (and you) likes it!

The first time the mistletoe goes up is the day after Thanksgiving. Steve is still getting used to the idea that 21st century America has decided that this is when Christmas officially starts (and even some folks who officially declare Christmas immediately after Halloween), but it’s been so long since he can properly take advantage of an extended holiday that he decides to make every (reasonable) day count. Bucky is surprised to wake up and find it just…there. Chilling casually at the top of the bed’s headboard. That would certainly explain why Steve is peppering his face with twice as many loving kisses upon just rousing. For a moment Bucky is afraid Steve is looking for post-feast sex which, while nice, feels like a bit much in the wake of a Thanksgiving meal of such epic proportions (super soldier metabolism or not). Instead Bucky rolls over and gives Steve a proper smack on the lips, commenting, “Is this gonna be our advent calendar? Different kiss in bed each morning between now and Christmas?”

“Who says it has to be in the morning?” Steve says, raising a playful eyebrow. “And who says it has to be in bed?" 

Bucky smirks. “Oh this _is_ going to be fun.”

* * *

 

On December 1st, the mistletoe turns up on the kitchen ceiling at breakfast. They lean across their plates of eggs, bacon, and toast and Bucky declares it an official christening of the Holiday Kitchen. He and Steve had always made a New Years’ Resolution every year and did what they could to hold each other to them. This time, Bucky is getting a head start and announces his goal to try twelve new recipes between then and Christmas, with selections from nearly as many cuisines from around the world. Steve wonders if this has anything to do with them watching that Disney movie about the rat who wants to become a French chef (it totally does) as he listens to Bucky with rapt attention as he describes his plans for cold-poached salmon with lime-ginger sauce and lamb-lentil stew and penne alla vodka and stir-fried noodles and more. Bucky makes the stew that night and watching him rush around the kitchen chopping vegetables and slicing meat and tasting for just the right amount of salt brings a bright smile to Steve’s face. It’s been god knows how long since he’s seen Bucky inspired to create.

* * *

 

The first weekend in December, the mistletoe turns up above the bathroom doorway. It’s a joke and they both know it, but they still make an effort to stay well away from the door when they hear the other flushing the toilet, no matter how thoroughly they think they washed their hands. The big exception comes at the end of the day, when Bucky waits patiently outside polishing off a large chocolate bar while Steve wraps up his shower. About ten seconds after the sound of teeth-brushing concludes, Steve emerges still dewy with residual steam as Bucky leans in and takes his lips. There’s a time and place for minty chocolate, and perhaps that best describes this kiss: a blend of cool freshness from one side and sweet molten sugar from the other. Bucky gets a little bold and dives in with his tongue as well, at which point Steve breaks the kiss with a chuckle and goes, “Goddammit, Buck, now I have to brush my teeth again.”

“Hey, gimme some of your tongue and maybe I won’t have to brush mine,” Bucky replies with an upward-crooked mouth. Steve re-enters the bathroom and gently bops Bucky on the forehead with his toothbrush.

* * *

 

On December 16th, the mistletoe stays in the loose change tray next to the front door. Neither of them put it up. It’s not a day for that. Steve doesn’t want to encourage any self-destructive behavior in his beloved (even though he won’t yet admit that he used to engage in it himself), but today he lets Bucky make an honest go at drinking himself into oblivion. If Bucky’s going to let himself beat himself up and drown in guilt for one designated day, then the least Steve can do is offer support and a safe environment for doing so. After months and months of “it’s not your fault” and “you didn’t have a choice” and all that, Bucky has finally made Steve resign himself to the fact that Bucky won’t forgive himself before he’s ready to. Steve wishes with all his heart, even wishing out loud on the first star he sees the night before, that Bucky reaches that point sooner rather than later. Bucky is three bottles in before something in him spikes. He’s a few inches from straight-up throwing the bottle against the wall before regaining a modicum of control at the last second and smashing it in the sink instead. Oh how Bucky wants to just pound the glass into dust, but either hand that happens with is going to have a hell of a time getting the shards picked out of it. So instead he grabs the other empty bottles and smashes them at the neck. Steve rushes to him as Bucky finally slides down to the floor in front of the sink, trembling both with ebbing rage and a sudden fear of himself. Bucky’s breathing goes ragged as silent tears start to spill out, a lull lasting only a minute or so before he caves to his anguish. Steve doesn’t try his old reinforcements of the truth that Bucky had no control over what he’d done that day. In this moment it’s better not to deny Bucky his feelings, just to let them happen. But Steve will always be his support: the arms around him, the warmth at his side, the crooning of the simpler truths (“I’m here, I got you, take your time, I love you…”). The only kiss that day is Steve pressing his lips to the top of Bucky’s head as he slumps in his lover’s embrace. It’s all they need.

* * *

 

On the first day of winter, the mistletoe turns up above the front door. Bucky’s out buying groceries and Steve’s making snowmen cookies for when he gets back. Steve wants the mistletoe on this day to be a welcoming gesture: a reinforcing sign that it’s okay for Bucky to come home, that he is still wanted and loved, that he will still be accepted during this season that shares its name with his vanquished old persona. Steve finishes spreading the cookies with white icing and is taking an indulgent scoop straight from the icing can when Bucky returns home. On any other day, it would be so very easy for Bucky Barnes to come home to find Steve Rogers welcoming him back with white stuff around his mouth and make some crack about “showing our age after all, eh Rogers?/finally growing the beard?” or something more lewd about “you been sucking off someone else while I’m out?” But today all the ex-Winter Soldier can say is, “Hey baby, you’ve got snowflakes on your lips. Lemme catch ‘em.” It’s cold. Not snowing yet, but enough to put snow on Bucky’s mind regularly. He’s used to the cold, but that doesn’t mean he likes it. Bucky sometimes wakes up shivering in the middle of the night, even when he’s covered with three blankets. Steve suggests they take a Christmas vacation somewhere warm, like maybe Miami or the Bahamas, or someplace more adventurous like New Zealand. Bucky politely declines on the grounds that it’s his first Christmas back in New York and he’d like to spend it here. Then he goes back to licking Steve’s face before suggesting some other possible uses for that icing.

* * *

 

On Christmas Eve, the mistletoe turns up above their bedroom door and they totally make use of the icing That Way, corny jokes about “you’re the biggest Christmas cookie I’ve ever eaten” and all. But even hungry super soldier tongues can only do so much, and they take showers and change to less sticky sheets afterwards. They lie in the dark with their fingers intertwined and their foreheads touching for a long time, first with idle conversation about snacks and the weather, then in silence. It isn’t broken until Steve suddenly breaks out in a quiet but surprisingly soulful opening line of “Silent Night.” He isn’t three words in before Bucky, “irony” not lost on him, bursts out laughing. Steve chides him gently before Bucky picks up the song where Steve left off. They wind up with a slightly off harmony but not really caring as they build to a dramatic crescendo, heartily belting out “SLEEEEP IN HEEEEAAAVENLYYYY PEEEEEEAAAAAAACE” while both standing up on the bed and raising their fists triumphantly towards the ceiling. Ohh, they would be getting complaints from the neighbors who certainly wouldn’t be sleeping in heavenly peace after that if it wasn’t for the soundproofing they’d installed in the place almost immediately after moving in.

* * *

 

On Christmas Day, the mistletoe adorns the star on top of the tree.

“We don’t have to, like…stick our faces in the tree and make out with pine needles in our teeth, do we?” Bucky asks.

“Nope,” says Steve. “We have do it… _under_ the tree.”

Bucky nods knowingly. “Well then, I guess we’d better get these presents open and out of the way first, hadn’t we?”


End file.
